


Old Men Dream of Summer

by Nanoochka



Series: Creatures In the Wind [2]
Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Avengers: Infinity War Part 1 (Movie) Spoilers, Bucky Barnes Recovering, Lonely Steve Rogers, M/M, Mutual Pining, POV Steve Rogers, Pining, Post-Black Panther (2018), Post-Captain America: Civil War (Movie), Pre-Avengers: Infinity War Part 1 (Movie), Shore Leave, Wakanda
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-07-18
Updated: 2018-07-18
Packaged: 2019-06-12 01:09:14
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 9,404
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15328413
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nanoochka/pseuds/Nanoochka
Summary: It's been seven months since Steve left Bucky in Wakanda. It's time he went back.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Takes place immediately after "Creatures In the Wind." You don't need to read that fic to know what's going on here, although it does give some context. Contains mild spoilers for Avengers: Infinity War.
> 
> Mad love to my girl [R.C.](http://rcmclachlan.tumblr.com) for patiently reading this and listening to me whine about it for weeks despite her total indifference to Steve/Bucky. <3

 

> “It was Carol she loved and would always love. Oh, in a different way now, because she was a different person, and it was like meeting Carol all over again, but it was still Carol and no one else. It would be Carol, in a thousand cities, a thousand houses, in foreign lands where they would go together, in heaven and in hell.”  
> 
> Patricia Highsmith, _The Price of Salt_

 

They travel the rest of the way on foot after T’Challa and Princess Shuri drive him to the edge of central Wakanda. Away from the Birnin Zana city center, Steve notices, away from even the scattered smaller villages they pass as the skyscrapers disappear and the mountains fade into the distance. Away from everything until he starts to see more cattle than people, goats, even a herd of zebra and the odd giraffe. It is green, beautiful country like something out of a guidebook, but remote.

Steve knows what remote means. A bomb could go off out here and you wouldn’t feel the tremors for miles. A bomb, or some other equally destructive force. Remote is a stone of unease that settles in his gut the farther out they go.

By the time they stop and T’Challa informs him their vehicle can proceed no further--the terrain is too forested for even a hovercar--the stone feels more like a boulder. Steve rolls his shoulders and starts to register that old tension creeping into his neck and back like before he left. 

Nat was already gone; she spent most of the trip thoughtfully silent when Steve revealed where they were headed. If she guessed his reason for coming here, she didn’t say, though she hugged him once before she took off, strong and surprising, and kissed his cheek with an earnest “Take care, Steve.” He wishes, now, she were still here. He keeps thinking of things he’d point out to her, jokes he’d make if she were walking beside him, blonde hair a bright pennant in the sun.

It’s March. The Wakandan air is thick as syrup as they walk, not the hottest temperature Steve’s ever experienced in his life, but damp and heavy with humidity. Steve stripped off his overshirt a couple clicks back, wishes he could get rid of his T-shirt too, his jeans and underwear, peel off his skin next to escape this heat like a wall. T’Challa and Shuri appear unruffled but amused at how much he’s sweating.

“Paler than a crocodile’s belly,” Shuri commented the first time he lifted the hem of his shirt to wipe his face. She’d smirked at his stomach as she said it.

“It is not much farther, Captain,” T’Challa informs him after the seven hundredth time Steve slaps a fly off his neck. They haven’t been walking all that long, and Steve is fine, a little sunburnt but not exhausted, but he’s sure he looks like someone threw a bucket of water at him. The last time he was here, he was in the air-conditioned comfort of the royal palace, barely outside long enough to begin counting the number of sweat trails trickling their way down his back into the crack of his ass. He’ll make a fine sight, whenever they happen to get to wherever the hell they’re going.

“I’m alright,” Steve insists. “Just a bit overdressed.” He’s about to explain he was in the Albanian Alps less than twelve hours ago, then bites off all further protests when Shuri gives him the hairy eyeball and thrusts a flask of water into his hands.

“So glad you’ve brought us another sad white boy, brother,” she comments to T’Challa, folding her arms as Steve pauses to drink. “I am beginning to understand why he and Sergeant Barnes are such fast friends.”

“Don’t be rude to our guest,” T’Challa murmurs. “Sergeant Barnes did not complain about the heat nearly this much.” He smiles slyly, eyelashes lowered. He slides Steve a sidelong look, not quite apologetic, then adds, “It is not typically this hot at this time of year, Captain Rogers. You’ve come in the midst of a heatwave.”

“I haven’t complained once,” Steve points out--and technically he isn’t lying--though he grins self-deprecatingly. There’s something about the way T’Challa smiles that makes him kind of helpless but to respond in kind. Bucky was always the same way. Contagious, irresistible.  

“Not with words.” Shuri makes a grumpy noise and snatches back the flask before Steve can finish it. “You should visit us again in January when it is like this all of the time.”

Steve doesn’t know Shuri well. They only met once, when Steve first brought Bucky here at T’Challa’s invitation. T’Challa had introduced her as his sister and Wakanda’s most gifted scientist, but Steve was so wrapped up in the thought of Bucky going back into cryo-sleep that he probably didn’t leave much of an impression. Just another sad white boy, indeed. But seeing this flash of adolescent petulance from her relaxes him somewhat. It’s familiar. Welcome. Plus it tells him plenty about how she feels about Bucky: she’s not as blasé as she’s trying to pretend.

They emerge from the forest at the top of a hill that leads to a small lake surrounded by lush foliage. There are a couple of thatched huts, what looks like a small farm with an enclosure for cattle, a couple horses, goats grazing nearby. Pretty pastoral. Steve spots a few kids running around, dressed in traditional burgundy-red shukas and holding rakes and a pitchfork. He notices a pile of hay and assumes they’re supposed to be working, but they seem more keen to chase each other around, startling the goats into bolting and kicking out while they giggle delightedly. No adults around, but it’s so calm and normal-looking that Steve finally finds the balls to turn and ask Shuri the question he’s been dreading since he found out Bucky was awake.

“Princess,” he begins, and she arches an eyebrow like she already knows what’s coming. “You said you’d managed to cure Bucky of his brainwashing. I’d like to understand how, and why he’s staying all the way out here in the boonies if he’s better.”

Shuri opens her mouth to reply, but T’Challa cuts her off before the first word makes it past her lips. “The simplified version, Shuri, please. Captain Rogers merely wishes to know his friend is alright. You may impress us with your big words later, after they have had a chance to become reacquainted.”

“Just because you struggle with big words, brother–” she singsongs and sidesteps the exasperated swat T’Challa aims her way. It earns a laugh, a grin shared with Steve, and he can suddenly picture it now, Bucky complaining about how it’s his lot in life to always get stuck with wise-cracking troublemakers.

When Shuri settles and turns her attention back to Steve, her expression is thoughtful but more friendly. “Sergeant Barnes is well. But I must warn you not to assume he is the same man you knew seventy years ago,” she explains slowly, voice soft. Kind. Steve tries to listen carefully to what she’s telling him, but for a moment the sympathy in her eyes is almost too much. “I developed an AI algorithm that could successfully remove Hydra’s trigger-word brainwashing, but there was no way to deprogram him physically without further damaging his psyche.”

Steve stops walking long enough to look at her, brow furrowed. “What does that mean?” he asks. “Is it--you saying he’s still a danger to people? To himself?” It comes out sharp. Too sharp. She might be more brilliant than ten Tony Starks combined, but she’s still a kid. A kid who’s trying to help.

To her credit, Shuri doesn’t bristle at his tone, but her voice is firm. “It  _ means _ ,” she says, drawing out the word slightly, “that I was not able to fix the mental and emotional impact the last seventy years has had on him. Not without destroying everything that makes him who he is. What he thinks and feels, what he loves and he hates. Whom he loves.” She meets his eyes steadily, much the same way Wanda had when she said to Steve,  _ You should go to him _ . “And you know the trauma he has endured is no small matter, Captain Rogers.”

“Then he’s–”

“Sergeant Barnes is well, Captain,” T’Challa interrupts. He places a hand on Shuri’s shoulder, calling her off, but it’s Steve he gazes at implacably until Steve takes the hint and backs down. “As well as can be expected. But that is why you are here, no? To be a comfort to him and to each other.”

Steve feels his expression twitch as he gets himself under control. Closes his eyes so he’s less aware of T’Challa watching this struggle. When he blows out a slow breath and gives a reluctant nod, T’Challa takes a moment to grip his shoulder too before he herds Steve and Shuri farther down the hill.

T’Challa gives Steve’s shoulder a squeeze. With a small, knowing smile, he tips his head in the direction of the farm, that serene lake glittering in the afternoon sunlight and the mountains in the distance. “Go, put your mind at ease. He will be glad to see you.”

There’s no sign of Bucky anywhere. Steve casts a puzzled frown at T’Challa but isn’t going to reject that invitation. He picks up his pace downhill, barely resisting the urge to run. He can apologize for his haste later, after he sees--

The kids finally notice their approach. With shrieks of laughter, they abandon chasing each other and come racing toward them instead, shouting, “White Wolf!” over their shoulders, back toward the huts.

In seconds Steve is surrounded, three sets of curious eyes looking up at him, big against their white-and-yellow face paint as they chatter excitedly, half in English, half in Xhosa. Full of questions, but most of it goes over his head except for the name they keep repeating--White Wolf. Is that supposed to be him? Steve smiles at them uncomprehendingly and lets them tug at his hands, his jeans. The lone girl among them pinches Steve’s arm with surprising force and cackles at his surprised bleat of “Hey!”

It just makes them giggle harder, but then he’s forgotten entirely when they recognize T’Challa and Shuri coming down the hill. Whoops of joy fill the air as they take off in their direction. Steve turns in time to see T’Challa almost go down as the boys launch themselves at him, the girl going to hug Shuri. The grin on T’Challa’s face is huge, his laughter startled and genuine. Steve watches them for a second, a smile twitching on his mouth before he looks back at the farm.

Drawn by all the noise, maybe, a figure steps out from one of the huts and lifts a hand to shield his eyes. Steve stops dead. He’s still a good twenty or thirty feet away, half-blinded by the sun, but damned if their eyes don’t meet and hold, both of them startled stiff. It’s been seven months. Somehow each time always feels like the first, like Steve’s the one who just woke from a long sleep, opened his eyes, and saw him there. A gut-deep sense of  _ Oh, it’s you _ .

“Bucky,” he breathes, the name partly caught in his throat. Like an old machine shuddering back to life, he starts to stagger in that direction, then quickens his pace to a jog. He’d run, but Bucky still hasn’t moved, and Steve forces himself to slow the hell down before he barrels him over.

“Steve?”

Steve can’t stand it. As soon as he’s within touching range, he grabs Bucky’s shoulder and hauls him in close. They’re suddenly pressed together everywhere like they’d climb inside each other if they could, and Steve inhales deeply, shakily, the woodsy smell of Bucky’s hair, clean sweat underlaid unexpectedly with coconut. The tearful, hollow noise he makes against Bucky’s throat is every moment of loneliness he’s felt in the last seven months trying to escape at once. 

After a second, Bucky says, “Steve,” again. Surprise forgotten, Bucky clings to him and shoves his face against Steve’s hair. He cradles Steve’s head in his hand. He wears one of the bracelets everyone in Wakanda has, and the heavy black beads click against each other close to Steve’s ear.

Steve can feel Bucky shaking. He holds on tighter, murmuring, “I’m here, Bucky, I’m here.”

They could stand like that for eons, but it still feels like all too soon that Bucky pulls away to meet his eyes. “What are you--what are you doing here?” he asks, then shakes his head like he just realized not touching is an awful plan. “God--come back here,” he says and grabs Steve again. He muffles his words into the side of Steve’s face. “I thought you were off saving the world again, didn’t have time to--”

They’re such idiots. What else is new? Steve shakes his head with his mouth still pressed against Bucky’s neck. “I made the time,” he answers, voice muffled. “I had to, I--I’m sorry it took so long. I’ve hated being away.”

“You’re a damn sap.” Steve can feel Bucky smiling. “I missed you too, Stevie.”

Steve needs to see him, see for himself that he’s okay. They separate far enough for Steve to get a look at him, his hand still cupping Bucky’s face. His hair is longer, past his shoulders, and his beard is almost as thick as Steve’s now. Last Steve saw him, he was the size of a house, bigger than a powerlifter through the chest and shoulders. A machine built to kill. He’s still muscular, same broad shoulders he’s had since seventeen, but he’s slimmed down somewhat, closer to how Steve remembers before Hydra ever got their hands on him. In plain work clothes, the sleeves of his shirt ripped off and a scarf draped around him where his shoulder ends, Bucky looks healthy and strong, tanned and unsurprisingly sweaty in this heat, a little dirty from working outside. And his eyes, well, those have never changed. They’re as blue as ever, still capable of leaving Steve feeling unsteady on his feet and stupider than a bag of rocks.

Steve’s smile is hurting his face. “You look good, Buck,” he says. Laughing wetly, then sniffling like the sap Bucky takes him for, he glances at the farm around them and asks, “Do you still go by Bucky? Or is it Old MacDonald now?”

“Yeah, yeah,” Bucky answers with a roll of his eyes. He can’t fight his smile and drops his hand to give Steve’s hip a squeeze. “You look good too, punk. Nice beard. Very manly.”

“Well, beards are the new stars and stripes, in case you haven’t heard.”

That earns him another laugh. Bucky ducks his head, gives it a slight shake, but when he meets Steve’s eyes again, his expression has turned somber and unbearably soft. Steve gazes back at him and gives a watery, closed-mouthed smile, skirting the edge of some unbearable ache that’s just now starting to ease. He opens his mouth to speak, but then Bucky smiles back and bites his lip, and Steve forgets every single one of the thousand things he wanted to say.

Someone clears their throat behind them.

Steve and Bucky separate. For a second Bucky’s hand lingers against Steve’s hip, leaves a palpable sensation of loss when he pulls away. Naturally T’Challa and Shuri are there, smiling, although at least T’Challa has the grace not to look entirely smug about it. Amused, maybe, but his knowing expression is sedate compared to Shuri, who grins at Steve and Bucky like the cat who got the canary. She thwaps T’Challa on the chest conspiratorially.

Steve blushes so hard that his face feels ten degrees hotter than the rest of his body, but when he glances at Bucky, he just has his eyebrows raised, looking more inconvenienced than embarrassed. If he’d had both his arms, Steve bets they’d be folded.

“Sorry to interrupt,” Shuri says. Bucky snorts.

“Yeah, okay,” he answers, deadpan, but Steve can see the mirth in his eyes, the way his mouth twitches. Sliding a glance at Steve, he bumps their shoulders together and says, “Welcome to Princess Shuri’s Home for Wayward Broken White Boys, pal.”

Shuri cackles, throwing her head back, and Steve sends T’Challa a pinched smile and a look of  _ what the hell? _

“You were right, Bucky,” says Shuri, still giggling. “He  _ does  _ look like an RL shrug emoji.” Bucky snorts and bites back a smile, glances guiltily at Steve, and that just makes Shuri laugh harder.

“You shouldn’t waste your time trying to make sense of Shuri and Sergeant Barnes’s particular sense of humour,” T’Challa says evenly. He gives Steve a look that seems like he’s just barely resisting rolling his eyes. “Believe me. I’ve tried.”

Bucky’s smirk takes Steve back to 1937 in an instant. “Steve’ll tell you,” he says. “Always did have the maturity of a teenager.”

“And normally I’d say the intellect to match,” Steve deadpans, “but in this case I wouldn’t want to insult the princess.”

The look Bucky shoots Steve makes him flush under the collar of his T-shirt; thank God he’s already warm and pink from the sun. T’Challa spares them further bickering by stepping forward and saying, “I have arranged rooms and for a meal to be served this evening in honour of Captain Rogers’s visit. Will you take time out of your duties to join us, Sergeant Barnes?”

Arching an eyebrow, Bucky looks toward the farm and his trio of helpers. A couple beats go by before he says, slowly, “I think it’ll probably still be standing in the morning, yeah.”

His tone doesn’t quite match the wryness of his words, and Steve cocks his head, studying Bucky’s face. It’s indecipherable, but it also hasn’t escaped Steve’s notice that T’Challa showed no hesitation in suggesting Bucky accompany them to the city. Bucky meets his eyes for a second only before he glances away.

“Children,” Shuri calls, then gestures for the kids to join them. They come running up, eager, and she says, “We must borrow your White Wolf. Will you see to the animals while we are gone?”

The boys nod earnestly, but the little girl frowns and puts her hands on her hips. “When will you be back?” she demands, looking at Bucky. She’s got big, almond-shaped dark eyes, and she squints at him reproachfully like a little adult.

“Tomorrow, kid.” Bucky crouches so he’s at eye level with the three of them. Seemingly impervious to her pouting, Bucky puts a hand on the girl’s shoulder. “I’m going to the palace to have dinner with King T’Challa and the princess. Can I trust you and your brothers to take care of night feed, make sure everyone gets back in their pens where they’re supposed to be? I don’t wanna come back and find a goat chewing on my bed.”

That makes the boys giggle, even Steve cracking a crooked smile. The girl gives Bucky the hairy eyeball for a second longer, but then she nods. Whatever her displeasure at the prospect of Bucky taking off, she doesn’t hesitate to take charge, pushing the shorter of her two brothers toward where the animals are grazing. “You heard him,” she says. “Go fetch the goats in.”

As they run off, Shuri nudges T’Challa with the same sisterly authority. “Come, brother. We can wait in the vehicle.” For all her pushiness, it’s a surprisingly kind gesture; Steve wasn’t the only one to notice Bucky’s hesitation.

Nor T’Challa. He doesn’t miss a beat. “Very well. See you in a moment, Captain. Sergeant.” He dips his head at them, and then they leave, Shuri’s hand on her brother’s arm as they make their way back up the hill.

Surely Bucky’s aware the tactful exit is for his benefit, but he doesn’t comment, just glances at Steve and offers a half smile. The kids are already rounding up the goats and herding them into their pen. A couple of the smaller ones give them a bit of a run for their money, but that’s all it takes to turn it into a game.

Steve gives Bucky a wry sidelong look. “Kids,” he quips, and grins when Bucky groans and pinches the bridge of his nose with a heartfelt “You’re the worst.”

They let the quiet settle around them like a blanket. It’s peaceful here, with the sounds of giggling children and goats bleating, the lake lapping gently at the shore just beyond that, crickets and birdsong and the wind through the trees. After a few minutes, Steve glances at Bucky and sees he’s let his eyes fall shut, listening.

His fingers twitch--he wants so badly to put an arm around Bucky’s shoulders and stay like that forever. Instead Steve shoves his hands in his pockets and watches him, trying to read traces of the past seven months in the lines on Bucky’s face and the curve of his lips, the sweep of eyelashes against his cheek, but then Bucky opens his eyes and catches him at it. Normally Steve would look away, blushing to his toes, but he doesn’t. Well, he blushes, but he doesn’t glance away. Lets Bucky see him looking.

Bucky cocks his head. For a second he stands there studying Steve back, thoughtful. He wets his lips and steps in closer. Something flutters in Steve’s stomach, half terror and half hope, and Bucky’s voice, when he speaks, is low and thrilling. “What’re the chances you wanna skip dinner?” he asks.

A small huff, not quite a laugh, startles from Steve’s throat. He smiles at Bucky helplessly. This is dangerous territory he’s been trying so hard to think around since he left Albania. Bucky suggests it so casually, like this isn’t a major focal point of Steve’s life, the foundation of his foundations. 

A small part of him wonders if it can possibly mean the same thing when it’s so easy for one of them and Steve’s been struggling to find the words his whole life.

Bucky’s expression shutters a little when Steve’s smile fades, turns apologetic. “I’d love that, Buck,” he says futilely. He can hear the wistfulness in his own voice and wishes it were enough. “But I’ve been following up on some stuff for T’Challa in the last few months. He’ll probably want to have a chat about it.” He hesitates, asks, “Do you not want to come? I could--”

Bucky shakes his head. “Nah. One thing to beg off when you’ve got an accomplice--another thing entirely when you don’t. Then you just look like an asshole.” He flashes a grin, bright like armor, the same kind of deflection he used all the time before he went off to war. This antisocial side of him is newer, though, creates a strange overlay of Steve’s memories of Bucky one on top of each other, leaves something less familiar behind. “My ma’d rise from her grave just to smack me one if I did that.”

“You sure?”

“Said I was, didn’t I?” Bucky brushes his hand against Steve’s arm and gives his shoulder a squeeze. But his smile doesn’t reach his eyes. “I mean it, Steve, it’s fine. Stop thinking so loud before you hurt yourself, alright?”

“But thinking too loud is my one transferable skill.”

That gets him a snort and a crooked smile, but then Bucky lets go of Steve’s arm and gestures vaguely. “Wait here. I’m going to go find some clothes that don’t smell like literal horseshit.”

He starts off, not toward the huts but in the direction of the lake. He looks unsurprised, only quirking an eyebrow when Steve ignores his instructions and goes after him.

Farther down the hill is a large thatched-roof cottage with a smaller outbuilding next to it, set back a bit from the lake and just before the treeline. They look like the round huts ubiquitous to rural Wakanda, but windowed and unique in their isolation. But on whose decision? Bucky doesn’t exactly seem like he’s been ostracized, if kids are hanging around him on the regular, and yet this is the first home Steve’s seen not part of a larger village or community.

There’s a fire pit outside and a single chair, a blanket draped over it haphazardly like someone got up and hadn’t yet wandered back. A book sits discarded too, open facedown. It looks like an old paperback, the kind you’d get at a drugstore, although the title is in Wakandan. 

Steve can picture Bucky reading here in the evenings, lit up golden by the flames as he stretches out contentedly. They spent so many nights like that by firelight during the war that he has a perfect image of it. Growing up, too, Bucky always had a book in his hand when he wasn’t working or out dancing or charming half of Brooklyn. In their apartment he’d stretch out in the most ungainly sprawl, long legs and arms thrown over couch backs or chair legs like the laziest of cats, moving from sunny patch to sunny patch.

Without issuing an invitation, Bucky pushes aside the curtain over the front door and goes inside. Steve hesitates briefly but follows. 

The cottage is sparse and simple, surprisingly spacious. Lights come on as they enter. Steve looks up at that, startled, but Bucky’s totally unperturbed, doesn’t even notice Steve glancing around like a yokel. He doesn’t know what’s more unnerving: that the source of electricity is totally undetectable, or that he never stopped to consider even the most rustic dwellings might be biometrically controlled like all the other Wakandan tech he’s seen. It’s seamless and invisible--indistinguishable from magic, Steve thinks wryly.   

Despite being a futuristic house of the future, it’s homey: plain whitewashed walls hung with textiles, a desk and chairs, bookshelf, and a comfortably-sized sleeping pallet with a thin mattress on top, plus blankets and pillows. Near the fireplace sits a low table surrounded by floor cushions, and there’s a mix of woven and skin rugs everywhere. A half wall separates the main room from what looks to be a basic kitchen. Steve looks around with unabashed curiosity; Bucky watches him do it. 

“You live here,” Steve says pointlessly. He doesn’t see much of Bucky in it, but what  _ is _ that supposed to look like? The old tenement in Brooklyn, or the sad, dark apartment he inhabited in Romania? Steve’s intel is old--years, decades old. The fact hits him like a slap. They know everything and nothing about each other, and Bucky, for all the old feelings he stirs up when Steve looks at him, is barely more than a stranger to him now. It feels a bit like grasping at the edge of a crumbling bluff.

“Yeah.” Bucky doesn’t call him on the obviousness of his statement, its uselessness. His face is… He looks suddenly uncomfortable, like trying to see his house through Steve’s eyes has left him feeling equally out of place. He gestures vaguely and adds, “Make yourself at home, I guess. I’ll just be a sec.”

Without waiting to see what Steve will do with himself, Bucky goes to an armoire and pulls out a change of clothes, then... leaves. Watching through the window, Steve, perplexed, sees him walk to the small outbuilding. A moment later he hears running water start.

Bucky returns while Steve is checking out the bookshelf. He’s changed and scrubbed clean, dressed in a navy two-piece suit with a collarless linen shirt. Steve gawks. A fresh scarf is draped around his left side, knotted at the opposite shoulder and leading Steve to believe they’ve all been tied this way beforehand to spare Bucky the trouble of asking anyone. His hair falls in wet curves around his face and trails water onto his shoulders. He’s far too dressed up for a farm, but for a king’s company, he looks a picture. Bucky never did screw around when it came to his clothes; that hasn’t changed.

Steve has so many questions. He doesn’t know why being here raises a million more or why Bucky’s demeanour has suddenly gone taciturn and cautious, but an unidentifiable tension hangs in the air. Suddenly the palace is the last place Steve has any desire to go either. He looks at Bucky, lost. Wants to make a joke but can’t think of a single punch line. Wants to stay but doesn’t know how to ask. 

It so often feels that the defining theme of their friendship is their desire to hide each other away from the world. For it to be, against all odds, something private and just for them. But is it pointless? It seems like something’s always calling them away, pulling them farther and farther apart from each other like a river forking in opposite directions. How long before they lose sight of one another entirely? Before they forget the way back?

Bucky’s expression softens. “C’mon,” he says resignedly and tosses his soiled clothes into a hamper. “Let’s not keep their royal highnesses waiting.”

 

 


	2. Chapter 2

Steve showers at the palace, as grateful to wash the sweat off himself as he is reluctant to leave Bucky’s side. If nothing else, Wakanda has the best water pressure he’s felt in months. Against his tight shoulders and skin too long untouched by anything other than violence, it’s just shy of a religious experience. Not sexual, exactly, but it makes Steve feel present in his body in a way he hasn’t for... a while. Present in his life, maybe. But what has he been doing for the past seven months, if not living? The answer is barbed wire around his chest.

Instead of dwelling on that too closely, Steve stands awhile with his head bowed beneath the spray, feeling water stream off his hair, his beard. Lets his mind drift, imagines Bucky living his life instead, going about his day in his house Steve’s never seen before, his farm, this whole utterly foreign existence of his.

He tries to picture himself in Bucky’s home but stops himself. It's not that he can't. At best it feels so much like hope, something that’s been in scarce supply lately. At worst it feels like an intrusion, like a spreading infection. In Bucharest Steve broke into Bucky’s apartment, upended Bucky’s life because he was desperate to help and Bucky was in danger. He isn’t now; Wakanda is safe, the safest. Steve’s the one danger trails after like a hungry dog, and he’s asking Bucky to let him in anyway. Like it’s somehow his right.

Steve’s maudlin mood has hardly lifted by the time he towels off and changes into the least casual clothes he packed. They aren’t remotely suitable for dinner with the king: a lightweight grey sweater and worn black jeans, boots that saw better days years ago. His reflection too is still a strange one. With his longish hair and beard and grungy clothes, his mother would’ve said he looks like a thug. That’s what Steve has turned Captain America into. Good for avoiding detection, as Nat constantly reminds him, but Steve’s sense of self splinters a little more each time he looks in a mirror. How is he supposed to know Bucky when he barely knows himself anymore?

When he makes his way to the dining hall from the guest room T’Challa gave him, he finds the three of them already gathered, joined by Okoye and the queen mother. The remaining Dora Milaje stand sentry at the doors. Shuri, inexplicably, is doing something to Bucky’s hair, half of it pulled up behind his head. He gives no sign this is anything abnormal, complacent as Shuri chatters at him and T’Challa and Queen Ramonda, but on seeing Steve, Bucky sits a little straighter. He scans his eyes down Steve’s outfit and meets his eyes. Shuri nudges him and grins, but Bucky elbows her back without looking away. At least Shuri is dressed more casually.

“Your Highness. Queen Mother. Princess Shuri,” Steve says. He knows not to bow, but he does incline his head respectfully at everyone, lingering on the queen. He nods at Okoye too with a murmured “General.” His ma would’ve been pleased to learn, no doubt, her strict adherence to manners had sufficiently prepared him for an actual royal dinner.

T’Challa holds out his hand to a chair his right and smiles; Queen Ramonda sits to his left. “Captain,” he says. He’s wearing a boldly patterned suit with a silk scarf slung over his shoulder, much like Bucky wears his. Steve wonders who started it.

He wipes his palms on his thighs and sits with an awkward smile of thanks. “It’s just Steve, Your Highness,” he says awkwardly. “I’m not--I don’t really do that anymore.”

“The half-dozen vibranium smugglers you’ve apprehended in the past several months beg to differ,” T’Challa points out with a quirk of his lips. “Not that I am not appreciative of your efforts. But if the title offends you, I will try to remember." While Steve is still trying to wrap his mind around when he began giving people the impression being Captain America offends him, T’Challa bows his head a little and says, with finality, "Steve.”

“And let’s not forget the Chitauri tech you brought me,” adds Shuri. She grins at him with a distinctly troublemaking gleam in her eye. “It’s a little primitive, but I appreciate the thought.”

She takes a seat next to Bucky just as their attendants bring around white towels and bowls of warm, fragrant water, the scent of lemon wafting on the curls of steam. Steve washes his hands when he sees everyone else do it, and then food starts being brought in. It looks delicious and smells even better, dish after dish of vegetables and fragrant, colourful rice, braised meats heady with spices, and bottles of honey wine.

Steve’s stomach gives a plaintive growl, which Shuri laughs at him for. He’s hungry all right, but he also can’t stop thinking about the quietness of the lake next to Bucky’s home, how softly the wind had sounded in the trees with no one but them around. He and Bucky haven’t shared a meal alone since 1942.

Steve glances up from the spread and sees Bucky watching him. His face is neutral, but his eyes are alert, knowing, like his mind’s still back there too. Back at the lake; back in Brooklyn and another life.

“What’s this about alien tech and smugglers?” Bucky asks once they have all been served. To Steve’s chagrin, he was served first, then Bucky, followed by T’Challa and the rest of the table. (Customary, T’Challa explained, for guests to go first, then the oldest men. In this case, Steve and Bucky just happen to be both.) But Bucky seems less caught up about that than zeroing in on stuff Steve’d really hoped they could avoid discussing anytime soon. He tears his gaze away from Steve to glance between him and T’Challa like the two of them are coconspirators. “What the hell are you doing out there, Rogers?”

Steve shrugs, sheepish. He tries to cover by taking a long drink of wine, but Bucky’s expression doesn’t get any less skeptical. He always knows when Steve is stalling.

“The world might not need Captain America anymore,” Steve tries, “but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t still need cleaning up. Nat and Sam, not to mention Wanda… We can’t exactly go home and retire, call it a day. We stay alive by staying on the move.”

“You could call it a day here,” Bucky says easily. Too easily. Then he adds, more pointedly, “Some of us have made it work.”

“I wouldn’t want to presume on anyone’s hospitality,” Steve says. He manages to keep his voice cheerful despite Bucky’s words hitting like a bullet to the gut. Always, always, they find their mark. “Besides, some of us are older by a whole year and three months. ’Bout time you retired, old man.”

Shuri snorts, and even Okoye and Queen Ramonda visibly fight back their smiles. Bucky, who’s been seeing through Steve’s bullshit for almost a century now, looks like he’s got plenty more to take Steve to task for--just because he can.

“A warrior’s duty is never over,” says Okoye. She looks at Steve and meets his gaze steadily, a rare gesture of approval. “Not until she breathes her last.”

“I’m afraid Steve and I have had more than our fair share of last breaths between us, Okoye,” Bucky drawls. “Besides, it’s better for everyone if I’m out of the fight.”

Steve blinks at him. “Says who?”

It’s T’Challa, of all people, who comes to Steve’s rescue. “Capt--Steve has graciously endeavoured to assist us in tracking down those who would steal from Wakanda or abuse her resources,” he says. “Since we moved farther into the public eye, the threat of smuggling is higher than ever before. We are greatly in his debt.”

“Pretty sure I was in yours first,” Steve counters. He purposely doesn’t look at Bucky when he says it, but it’d be a stupid argument to get into, anyway. T’Challa will insist until his dying breath that his offer to help Bucky was a gesture of reconciliation, not a ploy to get one over on Steve. He doesn’t work that way. While his moral code is a little more black and white than Steve’s, his duty to Wakanda paramount, he’s got a sense of justice Steve respects the hell out of.

“But it’s not just that,” he continues. “Too much tech from the Chitauri invasion slipped through the government’s fingers--international arms dealers have been having a field day. Now it’s turning up all over Europe and the Middle East, Asia, here in Africa. We thought the weapons trade was bad before? It’s got nothing on this, the destruction this stuff can do in the wrong hands. And I can’t help but feel partially responsible.”

“How?” Bucky bursts out. He rolls his eyes dramatically. “Jesus, Steve. It was an attack literally from outer space. Not like you issued an alien race a written invitation to come and--”

“Shuri has designed the most exceptional prosthetic for our White Wolf,” Queen Ramonda interrupts patiently, like she is used to enduring bickering at the dinner table all the time. “It is quite something, if I might say so. Is that not correct, Shuri?”

That name again: White Wolf. Steve looks at Bucky with his eyebrows raised, then Shuri. Oddly enough, she cringes, and then she and Bucky exchange a brief look she quickly covers up with a haughty expression. “Well, I could hardly have designed him an inferior one,” she says, and Queen Ramonda smacks her on the arm. “Ow! What? I’m just saying it’s a nice arm. It’s not my fault he didn’t want it.”

Without meaning to, Steve drops his fork. Bucky gives him an unimpressed look, but what does he expect Steve to do? “What do you mean, you don’t want it?”

Bucky waves his hand dismissively, but as Steve glares at him, at least he has the grace to look abashed. He drops his eyes. “I promised T’Challa I’d only take it when I’m needed. Until then…” He shakes his head. “I’m done with all that.”

“It’s--it’s an arm,” Steve says. Then to Shuri: “Did you build him an arm, or a weapon?”

That manages to get Bucky to look at him again--sharp this time. Even T’Challa glances at him with uncharacteristic reproach. Steve blushes as soon as the words are out, embarrassed for sticking his foot in it, but he clamps his mouth shut and refuses to apologize until he hears something approaching an explanation. He doesn’t care who from.

“Supposedly a shield isn’t a weapon either.” It’s Bucky who speaks in Shuri’s defense, not T’Challa, who subsides and sits back in his chair with a neutral expression bordering on approval. In the several months Steve’s gotten to know him, T’Challa has shown himself to be someone who dislikes duplicating effort. Clearly he’s confident Bucky and Shuri can take Steve down a peg without his help. Hell, Steve can take himself down a peg on his own, no assistance required. This dinner has more than proved that already. “Don’t be dense, Steve. It’s not a good look on you.”

“A tool doesn’t decide its own purpose. Rather the person who wields it,” Shuri answers calmly, like Bucky hadn’t spoken. That she’s brilliant was never in question, but now Steve gets a flash of maturity and poise she’s until now concealed behind humour and mischievousness, a foil to T’Challa’s gravity. But she’s got a similar queenliness to Nat, that same ability to switch it off and on at will. It shouldn’t be so surprising just because Steve was still half a fool at her age. “Your own hands can kill just as easily as they can hold a baby, Captain Rogers, and yet you’ve shown yourself to have a strong preference toward one more than the other.”

Steve feels himself go hot to the tips of his ears. T’Challa notices, and his inaction--and willingness to see Steve put in his place--ends there. He holds a hand toward Shuri with a hiss and a quelling look. But not because she’s wrong. Probably some protocol against calling out guests over the first course, which Steve decidedly violated first.

“What I believe my sister means,” T’Challa says, gaze not shifting from Shuri, “is we have seen, firsthand, that Sergeant Barnes has not always been an instrument of his own will or choosing.”

Steve struggles to smother his own hurt pride for a second until he finally exhales a sharp breath through his nose and says, more to Bucky than anyone, “I know that. No one’s disputing that Bucky deserves to choose what he wants to do, least of all me. If I did, I wouldn’t be an internationally wanted criminal, and you wouldn’t be hiding out on a farm with a bunch of goats.” He gestures mutely for a moment, unsure how to find the right words. “But, Buck... you’re being given this opportunity to be whole again, and instead you’re just gonna--”

“‘Whole’?” Bucky interrupts. He started off listening patiently enough, but at this he leans forward, eyes glittering at Steve dangerously the same way as when he’s got a rifle in his hands. All at once, Steve feels the blood drain from his face. Knows his mistake immediately. “I wasn’t whole the last time I had all my limbs accounted for, Steve, not during the war, and definitely not when Hydra picked me up and turned me into their attack dog. They made every part of me a weapon. Not just my arm.”

“Bucky, I know that--”

He keeps going, right over Steve like he hadn’t spoken. “So when you say I deserve to choose, Rogers--me, James fucking Buchanan Barnes--why do you think that entitles you to an opinion?”

You could hear a pin drop in the ensuing silence. Steve’s so shocked by Bucky’s vehemence that for a second he forgets to breathe. Then he meets Bucky’s eyes and forces out, “I guess it doesn’t, Buck.”

Bucky sits back in his chair heavily, the movement as defeated as it’s possible for a thing to be. His expression is tight, closed-off. He clearly isn’t enjoying this, gets no satisfaction from ripping into Steve in public, but nor does his determination waver.

“You’re right. It doesn’t. So just.” He shakes his head, a small, frustrated motion, and exhales heavily through his nose as he squeezes his eyes shut. When he opens them again, he meets Steve’s gaze. “Just stop trying to… to manage everything for five minutes in your goddamn life.”

Everyone at the table has gone quiet, like they know better than to intervene. The conversation’s already been run into the ground, maybe. Or maybe Steve’s just that much of a fucking idiot. He blinks and realizes his heart is pounding in his chest.

Bucky exhales hard again, unhappiness plain on his face as he pushes himself away from the table with a nod at T’Challa, then the rest of the table, and a terse “Excuse me, Your Majesty.” He gets up and walks off. The Dora Milaje at the doors let him pass. Their spears clink against the floor as they move out of his way, then close ranks once he’s left.

Steve manages to sit still a further twenty seconds before he can’t hold it in anymore. He gets up too. “I’m sorry. I have to--” Without bothering to finish his sentence, he goes after Bucky.

He hears Okoye ask in a bored voice, “Are they all like this?”

Bucky couldn’t have gotten far, and as it turns out, he wasn’t trying to; Steve almost overshoots him as he jogs down the hallway outside the dining room, only to shuffle to a halt when he finds Bucky glowering around the next corner, arm folded across his chest. He’s breathing hard through his nose, bullish.

“Buck,” Steve starts. The pleading note in his voice--Steve doesn’t think he’s imagining that.

Bucky flicks him a quick glance and then away, goes back to glaring a hole in the ground. “Just go back and eat your dinner, Steve. It’s fine.”

Steve huffs and folds his arms, then unfolds them again when he and Bucky just end up faced off, staring, mirror images of misery. “Yeah, I can see that everything’s fine,” he snaps. “This is--what the hell happened in there?”

Pretty much as Steve predicted, “fine” goes to hell in a handbag pretty fast. Bucky gives him an incredulous look.

“‘What happened?’ Are you serious right now?” he asks, then laughs a bit meanly. “Steve fucking Rogers happened, that’s what. Do I really need to give you a goddamn recap of exactly how much of a jackass you were just now? Because you actually might have found a way to outdo yourself in the ‘Captain America knows better than everyone in the world ever’ department.”

Steve rocks back a step. “I do not think I know better than everyone,” he says. He sounds so offended that even Bucky rolls his eyes. Steve narrowly avoids clutching his chest when he says it, but he wants to. Bucky’s gotten up close and personal with Tony Stark, and he thinks Steve’s the one with a god complex? “Bucky, what the hell. I am making half this shit up as I go, same as everyone else.”

“You think I don’t know that, Steve?” Bucky’s eyes are practically bugging out of his head. “Me. Of all people. I’ve been watching you bluff your way through life since you were six years old. That’s what makes it all the more infuriating when you try to turn that shit on me.”

Steve pinches the bridge of his nose but then drops his hands and his guard along with it. His voice is tight. “Listen, I don’t dispute that I stepped in it in there. I did, and I’m sorry. But I also feel kind of blindsided and like things got blown way outta proportion considering we were thrilled to see each other a few hours ago. Now we made ourselves look like asses front of the royal family, which something I honestly never thought I’d hear myself say.”

“Hey, pal, you did that without any help from me.”

“Bucky--”

“I was thrilled to see you. Still am, you ass,” Bucky snaps, and Christ above, only he could make something fond sound like the biggest thorn in his side. Steve wants to roll his eyes because he may love this man more than anyone on earth, but he’s as stubborn as a goddamn mule. The most ill-timed twinge of Brooklyn comes out in Bucky’s voice as he throws his hand out and demands, “What, you’re not happy to see me anymore ’cause I called you dense?” He snorts, then mutters, “It’s true, in case you were wondering.”

“Of course I’m happy to see you!” Steve practically shouts back. “I’ve wanted nothing but to see you for seven damn months, jerk!”

His vehemence dries up almost as quickly as it erupted. The force of it, of all things, makes Bucky’s mouth twitch. Steve sighs in exasperation and rubs his forehead.

“I’m happy to see you,” he repeats, trying to keep his voice measured. “But ever since T’Challa invited us back to the palace, you’ve been on edge. What the hell is going on with you?”

“I just--” A muscle leaps in Bucky’s cheek when he clenches his jaw for a second. “I just don’t wanna talk about the arm, okay? The arm or fighting or anything else.”

“But--”

“Steve.” Bucky doesn’t raise his voice, but the way he says that one word cuts sharper than a knife. Ironically it gives the lie to what Steve was trying to say earlier: in the right hands, just about anything can be a weapon, up to and including Steve’s name. The way Bucky tightens his fist makes it look like he wishes it were something tangible, something he could brandish. “I know you think you mean well, but my tune ain’t gonna change from what I said back there. This isn’t something you get a vote on. So if you care about this friendship even a little, you’ll drop it.”  

“If I care about--”

Bucky’s eyes go bright with challenge. Steve shuts the hell up. For a second all he can do is set his jaw, but this isn’t a hill he’s willing to die on. He made his mind up a long time ago there are plenty of hills he’ll die on for Bucky, but never, never against him. He wonders if Bucky knows that yet. Maybe he doesn’t.

If that’s really the case, that’s kind of on Steve, isn’t it?

“Okay,” he says, then exhales a long, frustrated breath. “Okay. Then we won’t talk about the arm.”

Bucky just stares at him like he’s waiting for Steve to break and start arguing with him again. He’s… not entirely wrong. Steve wrestles with the desire to say something else, and so for several long seconds, all they do is look at each other, braced, breathing hard. Eventually Steve bows his head and waits for the tension to break, just enough that it’ll feel like some of the air's returned to the room.

“I’m not gonna apologize,” Bucky says when the silence starts to feel thick enough to drown in. But his voice is softer now, almost a sigh.

Still looking at the floor, Steve shakes his head. “You shouldn’t. You’re… you’re right. I’m sorry I pushed.” He lifts his gaze to meet Bucky’s in a gesture of sincerity.

“No, you’re not.”

So much for sincerity, then. Steve resists the urge to scoff. “Fine, then I’m sorry I pissed you off about it. I don't get to tell you how you should feel about--about something that was done to you against your will. Wasn't my place."

“Yeah, well." Bucky swallows. Gives that damn smile again, the one that doesn't reach his eyes. "If I had a dollar for every time you stuck that giant nose in where it doesn’t belong, I’d be the next Tony Stark.”

That gets a huff out of Steve. Bucky’s forgiveness never comes for free, but it does come, and Steve leans his shoulder against the wall and hangs his head, tries to feel relieved. Mostly he feels sick to his stomach, and his throat is suddenly tighter than it should be. "You aren't less to me because you've only got one arm, Buck," he manages. When Bucky snorts, lifting his eyebrows like Steve just told a bad joke, Steve grumbles, “I’m glad my misery is amusing you.”

“You’re the worst at apologizing of anyone I’ve ever met,” Bucky deadpans. “Just--truly pitiful, Rogers, I mean that from the bottom of my poor amputee heart.”

Steve makes a disgruntled noise, and Bucky, still fighting a smile, rolls his eyes and looks for a moment like he’s considering just walking away and leaving Steve there to wallow, but his indulgent side wins and he put his arm around Steve instead. It’s not quite a hug, probably looks more like a football huddle than anything, but Steve leans into it all the same and wishes he could close the distance properly. He settles for resting his forehead against Bucky’s shoulder, hunching to do it, then decides to hell with it and puts his arms around Bucky’s waist.

“Yeah, big guy, I know,” Bucky sighs. His voice, low and so close to Steve’s ear, sends a small shiver through him. A second later Steve feels Bucky lift his hand to comb his fingers through his hair, gentling as much as satisfying his seeming curiosity about how long Steve’s let it get. “I don’t know what the fuck I’m doing either.”

Steve snorts. He lets himself enjoy this closeness a minute, but then he lifts his head to peer at Bucky. He looks--there's still something too tight in his jaw, a muscle that won't unclench, but at least he looks slightly less murderous. “So that’s all that’s going on," he hedges.

Regretfully that makes Bucky let him go. Steve steps back and hopes he looks concerned instead of just disappointed.

Bucky gestures at nothing. He seems to struggle with himself momentarily, but then the words emerge in a flood, rushing out. “I don’t... I don’t come here often, to the palace. Don’t like the city much anymore, and--I got those damn kids forever underfoot. I love them, but they ain’t gonna remember to do night feed.”

At first all Steve can do is blink. Then: “Night f--wait, you mean the goats?”

“They ain’t just goats, Steve. There’s cows. There’s a horse. There’s a whole lotta other things.” Bucky almost spits it, back to being snippy like no one’s business. Because it’s honestly Steve’s fault he didn’t stop to take down an itemized list of every creature Bucky's accumulated in his sudden career change to Wakandan animal husbandry.

Steve isn’t always the most emotionally aware individual, as Sam is constantly pointing out to him and which Steve was recently reminded of in his confrontation with Wanda, but he is when it comes to Bucky. For all the little mysteries of Bucky's new life here, there are some things, immutable, Steve still knows like the back of his hand. And this, the way Bucky alternates between balling his hand into a fist and raking it through his hair, the way he was laughing a second ago but now won't meet Steve's eyes--that isn’t about night feed or any of the other crap Bucky’s spouting and trying to pass off as gospel. If Steve's a shit liar, it's because he learned it from this jerk right here.

“So we’ll go do night feed,” he says like it’s obvious. Shrugs. “Problem solved. I’ll grab my bag.”

“We’re in the middle of dinner.”

“After we both stormed out like a couple idiots? We’ll be lucky if they ever invite us back.” Steve puts a hand on Bucky’s shoulder and gently steers him back to the dining room. He’s met with momentary resistance before Bucky gives in and lets himself be dragged. “C’mon. Let’s go feed your chickens.”

“You aren’t funny.”

“Oh, I’m sorry,” says Steve, full of blatant insincerity. “I didn’t realize I was holding up the line of other people volunteering to help you with your goddamn mules--”

Bucky rolls his eyes. “You almost make it too easy,” he mutters. “Almost not worth making the joke.” The sheer exasperation on his face wrings another chuckle out of Steve, though he tries to stifle it--unsuccessfully--as Bucky shakes his head and turns his back on him, walks away. The hunch of his shoulders hides a smile.

Steve pokes his head back into the dining room and offers as contrite a look as he knows how, complete with the Captain America smile that probably just looks deranged under the circumstances. “Uh, hi,” he begins when four pairs of eyes turn toward him warily. “Do you think we could borrow a hoverbike?”


End file.
